Cleaning up 'mud'

[SethTheGreat]

I feel like there is a lot of 'mud' in this mix. The guitars and the other instruments seem to be walking on each other a bit and I also feel like its diminishing my stereo spread.

I know, I've read time and time again to 'carve' out a little space from each instrument to allow room for the others. Problem is, it seems like if I pull a little low-mid out of the guitars (for example) it leaves the guitars sounding too thin, etc...

I guess I'm not fully understanding this EQ balancing act..

Any suggestions?

The guitars and bass are Kemper. Drums are Metal Machine with "Matt Damon" kick and snare blended at about 60% (Thank you fenixdoido! Thank you Lasse!).

Vocals are SM7B into my SCA A12.

Slate VCC and VTM scattered around the mix.

No EQ other than Hi Pass and Lo Pass.

Some gclip and L1 on the 2bus.

(don't judge the song too harshly and please forgive the intro, it's crap my old band mates and I wrote back in like 2000 when we were in high school :\ the actual song starts at about 0:24)

 

[GearMan2point0]

Try taking out the low mid of the bass brah

 

[SethTheGreat]

I will try that as soon as I get a moment to get back in to my studio. Thank you sir!

 

[iceman666]

Im on my earphones and the treble seem to come out more here but im positive that there is a 2k fizz. Try messing around in that area.
And i dont hear the kick as much as i should have done in a mix. Try fixing the guitar fizz first and things might be a little more clear

 

[SethTheGreat]

Just wanted to thank you both very much! I think I may have just cleared up all the problems I was hearing thanks to your suggestions.

Gearman, I'm the bassist so I imagine that's why I wasn't being objective about the bass tone. Cleaning up the low mids in the bass helped a ton. It still sounds the way I want it to, but it's not masking the guitars.

Iceman... Great ears man! I found a nasty fizz at 1900 that I wasn't noticing before. After cutting that, I was even able to bring the guitars up quite a bit. I didn't realize I was having to keep the guitar levels too low to keep that fizz from being audible until after I cut it.

I'll post it after I let my ears rest and I'm positive they were good decisions